Quick Links

Club PA 2.0 has arrived! If you'd like to access some extra PA content and help support the forums, check it out at patreon.com/ClubPA

The image size limit has been raised to 1mb! Anything larger than that should be linked to. This is a HARD limit, please do not abuse it.

Our new Indie Games subforum is now open for business in G&T. Go and check it out, you might land a code for a free game. If you're developing an indie game and want to post about it, follow these directions. If you don't, he'll break your legs! Hahaha! Seriously though.

Our rules have been updated and given their own forum. Go and look at them! They are nice, and there may be new ones that you didn't know about! Hooray for rules! Hooray for The System! Hooray for Conforming!

The six Democrats who won on Tuesday — Nancy Nusbaum, state Representative Sandy Pasch, Shelly Moore, state Representative Fred Clark, Jessica King and Jennifer Shilling — will now seek to unseat six incumbent Republicans in recall elections on August 9.

Why is this news? Well, it's because their primary challengers were actually Republicans who registered as Democrats in order to slow down the recall process.

* Shelly Moore, a River Falls teacher and official in the state's teachers union, defeated Isaac Weix of Menominee, a hardware store owner and former failed candidate in Republican Party primaries for state Assembly. She'll face Sen. Sheila Harsdorf (R-River Falls) in the general election. Weix did the best of all the Republican-backed candidates.

* Rep. Fred Clark (D-Baraboo) defeated Republican Rol Church of Wautoma for the right to face Sen. Luther Olsen (R-Ripon).

* Jessica King, former deputy mayor of Oshkosh, defeated John Buckstaff of Oshkosh and will now go up against Sen. Randy Hopper (R-Fond du Lac).

* Rep. Jennifer Shilling (D-La Crosse) defeated James D. Smith, a hospital technician in La Crosse. She will now take on Sen. Dan Kapanke (R-La Crosse).

When Scott Walker isn't trying to drive the Democratic party from Wisconsin and sell the state's future to the Koch brothers, he likes to sit down with a nice cold beer, as long as it's macro-brew shit.

Wisconsin has three tiers, like many other states, for alcohol distribution: a brewer, a wholesaler that distributes the beer and a retailer that sells it. The system was put in place at the end of Prohibition and used by brewers that made Milwaukee famous: Miller, Blatz, Schlitz and Pabst. (They've since moved all or most of their facilities out of the state.)

The proposal was inserted into the proposed state budget by the Legislature's budget committee. It would combine the brewer's permit and wholesale and retail licenses given out by municipalities into a single permit under state control. It would effectively ban brewers from purchasing wholesale distributors — something craft brewers say they might need in the future to avoid getting squeezed out of the market by large corporate brewers.

If that fails they'll just alter the law so that Democrats need double the number of votes to win, we literally cannot win back the state as they have the ability to pass whatever they want and they own the court.

If that fails they'll just alter the law so that Democrats need double the number of votes to win, we literally cannot win back the state as they have the ability to pass whatever they want and they own the court.

They can make it harder for Democrats to vote. They can gerrymander districts. They can try to de-fund their opponents. They can't change the fact that Wisconsin residents are generally honest, hardworking folk that believe in fair play. They also believe in voting.

I mean, to be honest, this thread, while depressing, also tends to give me some sort of hope. Because you guys do care and this is a good place for us to get news and for you all to gather and exchange news and stuff.

I have to think it can't be that difficult - particularly with modern computer simulating and calculating potential - to automatically divide a state's districts based on population density and arbitray longitude and latitude. Or find the geographic center of the state and send out spokes to the border while making sure each 'pie' has an equal population. Automatically redistrict after a census, no one gets to redistrict them for their own gain.

Sure you might get some people who're stuck out in the boonies away from a polling location, but that is better than having the power of the day redistrict you so that your vote is effectively discounted. You'll probably also get ridiculous things like someone in Appleton being in the same district as Milwaukee and not feeling 'adequately represented,' but hey. If your district is defaulted to another party's power because of how the districts are reorganized for the party in power it won't much matter.

There are any number of ways to take the partisanship out of redistricting. The government does all kinds of things that aren't political gamesmanship, just people doing their job. Redistricting should be like that.

There are any number of ways to take the partisanship out of redistricting. The government does all kinds of things that aren't political gamesmanship, just people doing their job. Redistricting should be like that.

I have to think it can't be that difficult - particularly with modern computer simulating and calculating potential - to automatically divide a state's districts based on population density and arbitray longitude and latitude. Or find the geographic center of the state and send out spokes to the border while making sure each 'pie' has an equal population. Automatically redistrict after a census, no one gets to redistrict them for their own gain.

Sure you might get some people who're stuck out in the boonies away from a polling location, but that is better than having the power of the day redistrict you so that your vote is effectively discounted. You'll probably also get ridiculous things like someone in Appleton being in the same district as Milwaukee and not feeling 'adequately represented,' but hey. If your district is defaulted to another party's power because of how the districts are reorganized for the party in power it won't much matter.

The whole redistricting thing via "MATH!" is actually a very difficult problem, to the point where supercomputers would be involved to get approximate answers. This is on top of the fact that perfectly random distribution of districts is actually the opposite of the intention. Some districts are gerrymandered to preserve majority minority districts.

The bolded above is a very bad statement regardless and really doesn't follow from the redistricting comments. There is no reason you can't have multiple polling places per a district. Shit, if I had to drive to the geographic center of my congressional district to vote I would spend about 5 hours in the car, one way.

The Economist had a good article on California's new way - basically an independent citizen commission that works with all the new census data. Sounds like it will do a good job of both equalizing/simplifying the districts and ensuring each district can have good representation in legislature. http://www.economist.com/node/18836108

Having a computer do it would be trivial. You'd simply divide the state into X thousand equally sized squares and find the population of each. You'd then join smaller squares which were adjacent until each joined square had equal (or close as possible to equal) population to the largest square. Then you just keep joining neighbors together until the population in each is equal and you have the right number of districts.

Having a computer do it would be trivial. You'd simply divide the state into X thousand equally sized squares and find the population of each. You'd then join smaller squares which were adjacent until each joined square had equal (or close as possible to equal) population to the largest square. Then you just keep joining neighbors together until the population in each is equal and you have the right number of districts.

That would still result in splitting blocks of voters and effectively disenfranchising them. If you split the only area in town with a high latino population 3 ways and mix them with upper class whites, that block has effectively been silenced.

Having a computer do it would be trivial. You'd simply divide the state into X thousand equally sized squares and find the population of each. You'd then join smaller squares which were adjacent until each joined square had equal (or close as possible to equal) population to the largest square. Then you just keep joining neighbors together until the population in each is equal and you have the right number of districts.

That would still result in splitting blocks of voters and effectively disenfranchising them. If you split the only area in town with a high latino population 3 ways and mix them with upper class whites, that block has effectively been silenced.

But if you take that area and deliberately make it a single area then it's voice has been amplified artificially. Yes, the computer is going to mess with things a bit, however I'm fairly sure you could set it to love clustering and then it would naturally group towns together and so on.

Having a computer do the districting according to fair laws which treat each person as equivalent is the only non-biased way. Yes, some blocks will be broken up, others however will probably be put back together.

Having a computer do it would be trivial. You'd simply divide the state into X thousand equally sized squares and find the population of each. You'd then join smaller squares which were adjacent until each joined square had equal (or close as possible to equal) population to the largest square. Then you just keep joining neighbors together until the population in each is equal and you have the right number of districts.

That would still result in splitting blocks of voters and effectively disenfranchising them. If you split the only area in town with a high latino population 3 ways and mix them with upper class whites, that block has effectively been silenced.

But if you take that area and deliberately make it a single area then it's voice has been amplified artificially. Yes, the computer is going to mess with things a bit, however I'm fairly sure you could set it to love clustering and then it would naturally group towns together and so on.

Having a computer do the districting according to fair laws which treat each person as equivalent is the only non-biased way. Yes, some blocks will be broken up, others however will probably be put back together.

Dude, what? That's not trivial at all. What you've described is a fairly strong heuristic that isn't fail-proof - what if you end up with a district-to-be that's underpopulated but hemmed in on all sides so you can't expand it?

I'm pretty sure solving this problem optimally is NP. I can't recall off the top of my head which NP-hard problem it reduces to, but I'm pretty sure it is. It's similar to some graph theory problems on node merging, and this would be an extremely dense graph due to the 2d nature of geographical distribution, plus having to weight distances between individuals because people aren't uniformly distributed.

(That being said, just because it's NP doesn't mean it's not doable. Just run it on a bigass computer for a few weeks and you should be fine. But far from trivial, and any implementation will involve some algorithmic tradeoffs that could have various political repercussions.)

Edit: The problem is clustering, which is defined differently via different algorithms, and has spawned a large number of NP-time algorithms, though there are poly-time algorithms that use stronger heuristics. Minimally though, choosing between the different categories clustering could result in very different electoral maps.

Having a computer do it would be trivial. You'd simply divide the state into X thousand equally sized squares and find the population of each. You'd then join smaller squares which were adjacent until each joined square had equal (or close as possible to equal) population to the largest square. Then you just keep joining neighbors together until the population in each is equal and you have the right number of districts.

That would still result in splitting blocks of voters and effectively disenfranchising them. If you split the only area in town with a high latino population 3 ways and mix them with upper class whites, that block has effectively been silenced.

But if you take that area and deliberately make it a single area then it's voice has been amplified artificially. Yes, the computer is going to mess with things a bit, however I'm fairly sure you could set it to love clustering and then it would naturally group towns together and so on.

Having a computer do the districting according to fair laws which treat each person as equivalent is the only non-biased way. Yes, some blocks will be broken up, others however will probably be put back together.

No, keeping that block together doesn't "artificially amplify" its voice. Malfeasance during redistricting can only marginalize, it can't provide more votes than are actually there. If you take a voting block you don't like and split it into parts, then put those parts into blocks that are solidly on your side, you've marginalized the block that you don't like. If you block like with like, you get a reasonable approximation of the actual proportions within your voting area.

That would be a more accurate summary if you mentioned that the benefits are paid for voluntary and the union dues are confiscated.

Except, you know, for the fact that Walker is actually confiscating the benefits that were paid for. Paying the union was an attempt to NOT get screwed over like that.

That's not really accurate either, is it? Is Walker actually confiscating any benefits, particularly any benefits that are already purchased by employees? Is he reducing the current valuation of pensions? Is he retroactively denying health coverage?

Also, is "paying the union" an accurate description? It might be just semantics, but I feel terms are important in this discussion, because each side is trying to claim rhetorical ground through the language they use to frame the debate. Union member dues are confiscated before the employee ever touches the money. There is no payment involved because there's no choice involved. Moreover, isn't it reasonable to think that at least for some union members, union dues weren't an attempt to avoid getting screwed in contract negs, but the required fee for getting access to the job in the first place - access controlled by union gatekeepers? Could it not be the case that some people would rather lose $4K in benefits than be forced to pay a monthy fee to support an organization they oppose politically, simply for the opportunity to work?

Likewise "Democratic primaries" - is that really accurate? Weren't most of them open primaries? Yes, shenanigans were all the rage in the primary challenges, and yes the main candidate in each primary was a Democrat who planned to challenge a sitting Republican, but my understanding is that they were not Democratic primary races.

Semantics are important sometimes, and any side degrades its position among those people trying to understand facts and chart a course through them, by engaging in these rhetorical misdirections.

Okay. I found myself about to dive into debate with Spool, but this really isn't the appropriate thread. If you want to argue about whether or not union dues are highway robbery, make a [Unions] thread.

Likewise "Democratic primaries" - is that really accurate? Weren't most of them open primaries? Yes, shenanigans were all the rage in the primary challenges, and yes the main candidate in each primary was a Democrat who planned to challenge a sitting Republican, but my understanding is that they were not Democratic primary races.

Semantics are important sometimes, and any side degrades its position among those people trying to understand facts and chart a course through them, by engaging in these rhetorical misdirections.

No. None of them were open primaries. Every single one was to determine the candidate who would challenge the Republican senator in that district a month later. If they were open primaries, like in Washington and Louisiana, then Hopper, Kapanke, and the rest would also have been on the ballots.

Likewise "Democratic primaries" - is that really accurate? Weren't most of them open primaries? Yes, shenanigans were all the rage in the primary challenges, and yes the main candidate in each primary was a Democrat who planned to challenge a sitting Republican, but my understanding is that they were not Democratic primary races.

Semantics are important sometimes, and any side degrades its position among those people trying to understand facts and chart a course through them, by engaging in these rhetorical misdirections.

No. None of them were open primaries. Every single one was to determine the candidate who would challenge the Republican senator in that district a month later. If they were open primaries, like in Washington and Louisiana, then Hopper, Kapanke, and the rest would also have been on the ballots.

My understanding was that in a Wisconsin recall election, the primary is open and whoever wins, challenges the sitting legislator. This is not the same mechanism as a normal election with an open primary.

Likewise "Democratic primaries" - is that really accurate? Weren't most of them open primaries? Yes, shenanigans were all the rage in the primary challenges, and yes the main candidate in each primary was a Democrat who planned to challenge a sitting Republican, but my understanding is that they were not Democratic primary races.

Semantics are important sometimes, and any side degrades its position among those people trying to understand facts and chart a course through them, by engaging in these rhetorical misdirections.

Calling the primary for the Democratic Party a 'Democratic Primary' is not a 'rhetorical misdirection'.

Likewise "Democratic primaries" - is that really accurate? Weren't most of them open primaries? Yes, shenanigans were all the rage in the primary challenges, and yes the main candidate in each primary was a Democrat who planned to challenge a sitting Republican, but my understanding is that they were not Democratic primary races.

Semantics are important sometimes, and any side degrades its position among those people trying to understand facts and chart a course through them, by engaging in these rhetorical misdirections.

Calling the primary for the Democratic Party a 'Democratic Primary' is not a 'rhetorical misdirection'.

My understanding was that in a Wisconsin recall election, the primary is open and whoever wins, challenges the sitting legislator. This is not the same mechanism as a normal election with an open primary.

Likewise "Democratic primaries" - is that really accurate? Weren't most of them open primaries? Yes, shenanigans were all the rage in the primary challenges, and yes the main candidate in each primary was a Democrat who planned to challenge a sitting Republican, but my understanding is that they were not Democratic primary races.

Semantics are important sometimes, and any side degrades its position among those people trying to understand facts and chart a course through them, by engaging in these rhetorical misdirections.

No. None of them were open primaries. Every single one was to determine the candidate who would challenge the Republican senator in that district a month later. If they were open primaries, like in Washington and Louisiana, then Hopper, Kapanke, and the rest would also have been on the ballots.

My understanding was that in a Wisconsin recall election, the primary is open and whoever wins, challenges the sitting legislator. This is not the same mechanism as a normal election with an open primary.

Yes, it is. In any election, whoever wins the primary goes on to the general election. Sometimes the incumbent must face a primary and sometimes not; some states require primary voters to be registered members of that party, and some states do not have party registration at all. A Republican entering a Democratic primary because he fills out the proper paperwork doesn't make it not a Democratic primary.

I find that for partisan offices, each party "holds" its own primary, but the sitting legislator is automatically nominated for his own party. However, there is no requirement that a candidate in a partisan primary election need actually be a member of the party holding the election.